Growing up, my family spent a sizable chunk of our school holidays back in Scotland; however, in Tonbridge, where we lived, those long summer days in the 1970s and 80s were spent outside, playing in local woodlands, rambling across fields, or cycling along the Medway footpaths. I recall that my friends and I all carried a small tobacco tin containing a penknife, some string, puncture repair tools, and other ephemera that I can no longer remember. We were packed off in the morning with sandwiches wrapped in foil, a Club biscuit and a small box of juice, and returned at the end of the day for our dinner. Towards the end of August, we were acutely aware that the start of the new school year was crashing towards us, and this always seemed to coincide with fresher mornings and clear skies that, in adulthood, many of my friends still refer to as ‘first day of school weather’. I suspect that we Gen-Xers are probably the last to have experienced this sort of childhood, which may have echoed those of previous generations. I don’t see much evidence of this now while walking around the parish.

The extremely hot and dry summer has clearly had a significant impact on the local landscape. The blackberries, which would usually be abundant, have all but gone; the shrivelled husks of those unpicked still cling to their stems, which I read may cause an issue for the birdlife in the coming months. The leaves have begun to turn on many trees, and in some cases, have already started to carpet the ground below. Even the acorns have dropped, miniature and insubstantial, leaving reduced hope for new saplings next year.

The first of the hopping mists appeared on the 25th, creeping across the fields and through country lanes, grazing sheep appearing, and then disappearing into the vapour. Cobwebs on trees, on the ground and between poles in the allotments, the gentle rock of an approaching season and golden dawn ‘windows’ between the gaps in hedgerows.

This is Platt at the end of August 2025.